... but it is an objective fact that coh2 sucks. Try to find another dev studio with Relic's track record. I don't know any other game where every patch breaks the game, ...
that is really not objective. its objective that it could be better.
I can name a few devs from my "game playlist": Squad, GTA IV, CIV, Rainbow Six Siege.
i have always seen cons as a defensive support squad which are to be used in conjunction with support weapons or tanks instead
similar to the volx from coh1. that's also the reason you can build them in t0. because you should use them as support for your penals / support weapons and not as sole attackers
actually i find the Basic design of coh2 extremely smart and astonishingly awesome
is there no way to make squads act like it was 2013 in yellow cover only?
remember the times when your squads just could not stay in cover at all? which was a big problem because it was even hard to get cons fully into their long sandbag cover.
have you ever tried to open up relic's map in the worldbuilder?
it can tell you what kind of splines Relic used to fill up the map. Their maps might not be balanced but most of them are exquisitely detailed.
In this case, why don't you look at "Brody" from the ToW mission pack 1 (the one that came with the game). The map is not quiet Steppe as you describe it because from my memory it had quiet a few buildings. But the map would've looked fine even without them - Relic basically used some elevations, sandbags, fences and different grassland texturing to make it look varied.
I have noticed it does not shoot behind shot blockers which is weird because it should and when directed to, it can unless the blocker is the forest-tree-collection-asset.